Western Railroad Discussion > Drill Track definition??

What is it? Thanks much.

On the WP, Drill Tracks were the switching leads within Industrial Parks from which any number of individual industrial spurs could branch off.

The different track designations were:
Drill
Runaround
Spur

I understand Drill Tracks in yards are used to keep the main clear of traffic. Switchers can do their thing, pulling cuts of cars out to put them in other tracks, while other trains can roll into and out of the yard.

MysticHowler Wrote:
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> I understand Drill Tracks in yards are used to
> keep the main clear of traffic. Switchers can do
> their thing, pulling cuts of cars out to put them
> in other tracks, while other trains can roll into
> and out of the yard.

Yes. Also known as an "industry" or "running track". This is not always a track in a yard but often a track parallel to a main line. The parallel "drill" track had three main advantages 1) kept the main line free from fouling by switch jobs and cars 2) avoided switch crews having to ask for multiple permissions to occupy the main track, leave cars on the main track or respond to requests to "clear up" 3) minimized the number of main line switches and related maintenance expense.

Bob

tomk's illustration is great. The diagonal track connecting the various rungs, which he didn't name, is called a "ladder" or "ladder track." So a drill track usually connects the main with the ladder track. Over this locomotives and cars move back and forth in switching, like soldiers on a parade ground, and that is why it is called a drill track. The drill track in most cases the same as the yard lead, where trains are assembled and disassembled.

Fred Harrison
Central Point, OR
CORPpower/JSS/EORS

A rose is a rose I guess, designating a track as a "Drill" may differ depending on the parlance of a particular rr, but the use of the term as I am familiar with it is rather specific.

In a yard, and depending on the design there may be "Main" Tracks or everything may revolve around the designated use of "Leads", or "Running" tracks or some other nomenclature. As to "Drill" tracks, one use I've seen is tracks that run from the bowl tracks(at the other end of the hump)so that cars can be pulled from the bowl and drilled into departure tracks to build a train. In the case of one large yard, these cars have no connection at their far end, there are crossovers at the bowl end that can be used to cross to a departure lead to access the individual departure tracks. In this way operations can be kept fairly fluid, that is only if a train is pulling out of that end of the departure tracks would drill crews be required to stop and wait for the train to clear. Some rr's may designate these as "Pull Downs", On others the pull downs are used to bring cars out of receiving tracks to be humped, just depends on practices used by different rr's(or in effect, if the tracks out of the receiving tracks are designated "Pull Downs", then by assigning the tracks at the other end as "Drills" it eliminates confusion as to track designations among crews and Yardmasters).

Here's an example. This posted diagram is the CORP Medford, OR, yard. From the south end you can see the drill tracks on the south end of the yard. However, CORP sends most of its traffic north, not south, so it uses the north end of the yard for the greater part of its switching. There is no drill here, but a short lead into the east ladder off the main and just a ladder on the west side off the main, so the main gets fouled when switching takes place here just about all day long. Switching has to clear the main each time to let other business through.

Fred Harrison
Central Point, OR
CORPpower/JSS/EORS

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tomk Wrote:
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> 3rd time's the charm...

I'd say you've mislabeled the "pulldown," in that from my observations, a "pulldown" and a "drill" have similar functions. The "pulldown" in your diagram would more appropriately be labeled "yard lead" or "arrival/departure track" or some such. Where I've seen the term applied, "pulldown" described a drill track used for building trains in a departure yard; the pulldown crew takes cuts of cars from a classification bowl and assembles them into complete trains. An ordinary "drill track," by contrast, would be used by a flat-switching crews taking individual or smaller cuts of cars and building classification blocks or, depending on the yard, entire trains from them. In any case, the term "drill" for a switching job analogizes the switcher's repetitive back-and-forth motion with that of the familiar shop tool making holes, so any track whose primary purpose is use by a crew doing such work could be identified as a drill track.

tomk Wrote:
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> This probably isn't where bowl tracks would
> normally be, but just for the sake of simplicity -
> take 4...

I only was a professional for the CB&Q and the CNW in the Twin Cities, so obviously my experience is limited and out of date, as well as specific to the local interpretations of the term, but I think tomk has best hit the definition according to my experience.

A lead could be used to switch cars into tracks from the ladder, as could the drill. The lead, however, could also be used as an entrance to the yard, while the drill was a stub which could only be used for switching.

This also agrees with the use of the term drill as it applied to the long defunct NP Mississippi Street Yard, in St Paul.

This being said, the "definition" is probably somewhat soft, and likely used differently elsewhere.

I also suspect, but do not have concrete confirmation, that in a pole yard, the lead would have led directly to each of the switches for each yard tracks, but the drill would have been the track parallel to the lead from which the switch engine actually ran to pole the cars on the lead.

MTMEngineer Wrote:

> This being said, the "definition" is probably
> somewhat soft, and likely used differently
> elsewhere.
>

Of all the posts listed in this thread, the above pretty well sums it up.....
Thanks MTM

V

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